Do you remember when the new versions of iOS can introduce primary redesses? iOS 7, I’m with you. Despite the annual rumors that predict a new main review of iOS, I am convinced that the days have ended. And a recent debacle of the application shows why.
Sonos, in case you haven’t noticed, has been through a very bad time recently.
The company recently replaced its CEO after months of trying to make its big mistake of 2024: releasing a first overhaul of the app.
The new Sonos app debuted in April, setting off a massive wave of customer complaints and bad press for the company that lasted the entire year.
It’s a perfect example of why the days of Apple’s early iOS redesigns are over.
If the new Sonos app had launched in the early era of the company, I feel quite confident that it would have been fine.
This means that even if the same problems had existed, the small, passionate user base would have adapted, or Sonos would have delivered the solutions and it would have been a debacle.
The story is with iOS.
When the iPhone still thrives, Apple will be able to “get away with primary redesigns” because its user base is much smaller and more technologically advanced.
These days, society depends so much on the iPhone. Hundreds of millions of users—with varying tech competencies—all depend on it.
If Apple made sweeping changes to how iOS looks and works, there’s a strong chance the backlash would be crippling.
Even if the review has been seen by many as a positive change, Apple’s user base is so large that there will almost certainly be strong opposition.
The solution is to allow iOS to stagnate, and Apple knows it.
Instead, Apple’s practice has been to make any significant iPhone changes on an app-by-app basis.
For example, changes to the Photos app in iOS 18 have caused a lot of controversy, leading to fixes in upcoming software updates, but it was just one app, so its effect was limited.
Revamping the whole of iOS? That would be a huge risk for Apple.
Whatever the validity of its main argument, Sonos’s debacle is a very bad comparison.
There’s redesigning something (like iOS 7), and there’s rebuilding something (like the Sonos app). They are very different types of work, different goals, and totally different ways to execute it.
IOS 7 did not mainly replace the underlying code or the operating system, it was only another layer of paint, with new features that any update of the operating system would introduce anyway.
Sonos built a completely different code base, so they lacked functions, because they had to restart from scratch. Its only defect was not to maintain the previous application available, while proceeding to update the new one to the parity of functions. Amateur time.
If Apple were to introduce a “redesign” of iOS, it would still yet be another coat of paint, not a rebuild of the codebase. iOS itself wasn’t even an original codebase, it was branched from OS X. So they’ll very unlikely run into any of the same problems as Sonos (ripping features away with no fallback).
Laughably, as the idea of a primary iOS 7 overhaul strikes me (and maybe you), peak iPhone users who are eager to replace might see it as a nightmare.
The Sonos debacle is a great cautionary tale for Apple and any other major tech player with a large, established user base.
It also means we’d likely want to settle for smaller, more iterative iOS design updates.
Do you think Apple will absolutely reconsider iOS? Why or why not?Let us know in the comments.
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Ryan made his debut in journalism as editor-in-chief, where he worked for 4 years covering Apple News, writing complaints about requests, etc. For two years, he co-hosted the podcast adaptation on Relay FM, which has been absolutely focused on the iPad. Consequently, it’s no surprise that his favorite Apple device is the iPad Pro.